November 23, 2020 To: the Massachusetts Federal Delegation

November 23, 2020

To: The Massachusetts Federal Delegation Senator Elizabeth Warren Representative James McGovern Senator Edward Markey Representative Seth Moulton Representative Katherine Clark Representative Richard Neal Representative William Keating Representative Ayanna Pressley Representative Joseph Kennedy III Representative Lori Trahan Representative Stephen Lynch RE: Federal CARES Funding

Dear Members of the Massachusetts Congressional Delegation:

Thank you for all of your efforts to encourage the passage of a COVID relief package and for being so responsive to our many state and local concerns during the pandemic. We were so grateful for the funding authorized under the CARES Act and eagerly await additional federal support despite the roadblocks you face.

As Mayors and Managers from across the Commonwealth, we are already looking ahead to the ways that the pandemic will affect us well into 2021.We are very worried about the looming deadline by which we must expend all of our CARES funding and we urge you to extend the deadline beyond the end of this calendar year.

Perhaps most importantly, federal CARES funding has gone to support our communities’ public health needs, funding local health staff needs across the Commonwealth. This staff is vital to our ability to continue contact tracing, cluster investigation, enforcement, and education. CARES dollars have also helped some of our hardest hit communities support quarantine and isolation facilities and ensure that they have enough PPE. CARES funding has helped ensure that our schools and workplaces are safe enough to allow our young learners to come back to school and to help businesses survive and adapt in this new normal.

The December 31st deadline creates an arbitrary end date by which we must spend this critical federal aid. But our needs will surely continue well into the new year and they are likely to keep growing as case counts rise. We need funding to address these needs, but the CARES deadline severely hurts our ability to meet these needs as they arise. If the deadline is extended, we can make critical investment decisions today that will help us as our needs remain high in the new year.

At the same time as we are asking you to extend the deadline, we are eager to see the passage of a subsequent federal relief package that provides critical revenue to communities and regions. At the state level, we are urging Governor Baker to make stopgap funding available for local health departments and high-risk communities. This state assistance would allow us to continue limited public health investments and give extra assistance to communities who are facing continued rates of high community spread, but it is not enough to enable us to ramp up our efforts to address the virus while we equitably rebuild and recover.

We hope that a second relief package will include at least the following items: expanded unemployment benefits; financial support for local, regional, and state governments; funding to address housing insecurity; support for expanding testing and contact tracing; and significant support for small businesses.

We stand ready to work with you to advance our shared priorities.

Sincerely, Thomas G. Ambrosino Scott C. Crabtree City Manager of Chelsea Town Manager of Saugus

Anthony Ansaldi Carlo DeMaria Town Administrator of Wenham Mayor of Everett

Brian M. Arrigo Louis A. DePasquale Mayor of Revere City Manager of Cambridge

Antonio Barletta Joseph J. Domelowicz, Jr. Town Administrator of Nahant Town Manager of Hamilton

Steve Bartha Kimberley Driscoll Town Manager of Danvers Mayor of Salem

Tom Bernard Chris Dwelley Mayor of North Adams Town Administrator of Dover

Paul Brodeur Gregory T. Federspiel Mayor of Melrose Town Administrator of Manchester-by-the-Sea

Richard Brown Leon A. Gaumond Jr. Town Administrator of Somerset Town Manager of Weston

Adam Chapdelaine Michael P. Gilleberto Town Administrator of Arlington Town Administrator of North Reading

Gary Christenson Brian P. Howard Mayor of Malden Town Manager of Randolph

Paul E. Coogan Gregory W. Johnson Mayor of Fall River Town Administrator of Maynard Melvin A. Kleckner Town Administrator of Brookline

Charles C. Kokoros Mayor of Braintree

Robert W. LeLacheur, Jr. CFA Town Manager of Reading

Breanna Lungo-Koehn Mayor of Medford

Thomas M. McGee Mayor of Lynn

Alex Morse Mayor of Holyoke

Melissa Murphy-Rodrigues Town Manager of North Andover

Neil Perry Mayor of Methuen

Andrew Sheehan Town Administrator of Middleton

Dr. Yvonne M. Spicer Mayor of Framingham

Sarah A. Stanton Town Manager of Bedford

Robert F. Sullivan Mayor of Brockton

Linda M. Tyer Mayor of Pittsfield

Lisa Wong Town Manager of Winchester

Jason Silva Town Administrator of Marblehead